


But I Miss You

by whimsicalmuse



Category: The Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-08-23
Updated: 2004-08-23
Packaged: 2018-08-07 15:59:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7720894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whimsicalmuse/pseuds/whimsicalmuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Billy POV. Greatly influenced by Warning Sign By Coldplay so I must give acknowledgment to them. Thanks to fluttering_by for the beta!</p>
            </blockquote>





	But I Miss You

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Shirasade: this story was originally archived at the [Monaboyd.net Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Monaboyd.net), which was closed in September 2014 due to software issues and a lack of new submissions for several years. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in October 2014. I e-mailed all authors about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this author, please contact me using the e-mail address on the [Monaboyd.net Archive collection profile](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/Monaboyd_Archive/profile).

No one ever told Billy how to cope with missing someone who was across the room. In fact, if he had asked somebody, they probably would have declared that it was quite foolish really, to long for someone that was a few steps away, but he did.  
  
He missed him.  
  
He’d tried to tell himself that the pull would go away, and eventually, yeah, eventually, he’d be able to look at his crinkled eyes, and crooked grin, and not want to draw into himself and die, but it never happened.  
  
He still missed him.  
  
He thought the pain would have gone away by now, that he could truly give himself to her, and shake away the memories: the smell of him, the sound of him, breathing, alive, and so very much so his. He tried not to think of these things, (only on days that ended with “y”), but when the sun went down and the moonlight washed down gloomy and icy over him, he had to sit in the dark and face things.  
  
And the truth of the matter is, he missed him.  
  
So now, he sat, arms full of another, eyes fixed on _his_ rosy face, rumpled hair, and listened to _his_ carefree voice, and bit back the lump that settled in his throat.  
  
Because, the truth is, he missed him, but he’d been the one to send Dom away.

 

~

  
He was tired. Each night when he laid down, he felt the worries he kept buried in his belly surface, burning bile in his throat, until he felt so miserable that sometimes he’d get up  
suddenly and lose all the contents of his stomach.  
  
And when he’d wash his mouth out, choking still, choking back acid, and choking back tears,  
he’d look up at his red face, and close his eyes, trying to ignore the ghost of a tear that always managed to slip out and fall.  
  
He’d have to curl back in bed then, and stare into the darkness knowing why he fell each time and had to brush off his knees and start again.  
  
Because the truth was, he missed him.  
  
His friends noticed his fatigue too, some would comment on it, but most just turned away. Billy thought maybe they thought he deserved every last bit of pain, after all, he’d been responsible for it; he’d been the one to turn the man away.  
  
But how was he to know something he did, in what was perhaps a misguided sense of propriety, would come back to haunt him so?

He never knew when he sent him away that he’d end up right back at step one reeling in his hurt as he missed someone that was an arm’s length away.  
  
Pieces of the façade started to chip and crack, brittle like sheets of ice, and he watched as the foundations of his house of cards fell away, until he was alone, and naked to the world.  
  
Eventually he had no one to turn to, not even his girlfriend; she’d had sense enough to leave him a long time ago.  
  
Someone once said the world was cold and cruel, but not for him. For Bill the world was a heartless Sahara: blistering hot, swirling in biting sands that dug in deep everywhere, until his skin was raw, and he wondered if now, now he should just curl up and die.  
  
And then, one day, the door opened, and Billy knew he was caught up in a mirage. Because there was Dom, glittering bright and solemn, standing just a few paces away, silently begging him to come to him.  
  
Come to him.  
  
But Bill didn’t know if he could do it. That space between them was so far, and he was so tired, it’d be much, much easier to stay here.  
  
Then he remembered the fire and acid of his nights, and the dry mouthed summer of his days, and he pulled, tugged at his will, and crawled back into his (open) arms.  
  
Because the truth of the matter was, he missed him.  
  
And when Dom embraced him, he was as cool as a shaded well, and his kisses were dewy. And Bill drank, as if he’d not had a drink in years, and when he thought of it, he hadn’t really; he’d sent Dom away, and then he missed him.  
  
Then Dom pulled back, eyes, face, lips, watery and cool, and pressed his lips to Bill’s ear, breathing in, out, in, soft against Bill’s hot skin.  
  
And in the stifling room, he took a breath, and whispered his secret into Bill’s ear.  
  
“I’ve missed you.”


End file.
